John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

Above everything else, this is a debate about the crucial importance and strength of the alliance between Australia and the United States. I am entitled, at the beginning of this debate, to put that front and centre of what I am about to say. I hope that, out of this debate, we can make a proper judgement as to which side of politics is better able to maintain the real strength of the alliance.

I do not argue for a moment that the American-Australian alliance is something that has transcended the political divide. It is true that Curtin made a famous declaration in World War II about looking to the United States and it is true that the President at that particular time was the Democrat Franklin Roosevelt. It is also true that the ANZUS alliance, which is the legal foundation of the alliance, was forged by the Menzies government during the presidency of Harry Truman. The treaty was signed in 1951. It is true that the Hawke government cooperated well with the Reagan administration across the political divide. It is true that I cooperated well with the Clinton administration, and I remind the House again that the very first occasion on which this country committed combat troops to the Iraq theatre was in response not to a request from the Bush Republican administration but to a request from the Democrat administration of Bill Clinton. There is no argument that across the political divide there has been cooperation to keep the alliance going, and I hope that will always remain the case in the future.

I reject at the very beginning the argument not only implicit but explicit in what the Leader of the Opposition said: that our side of politics cannot cooperate with the Democrats. I reject the allegation that the remarks I made yesterday—and this is plain from their context—were a generic attack on the American Democrats. As the Leader of the Opposition himself said, there is a great range of views on Iraq inside the Democratic party and amongst their supporters in congress. For example, Joe Lieberman, a man of very great principle, who had his Democrat preselection wrenched away from him by the anti-Iraq Democrats, was successful in winning re-election to the American Senate.

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